Eyes Fixed E-Book

T.C. Stallings

• Herausgeber: BroadStreet Publishing Group, LLC
• Kategorie: Religion und Spiritualität
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2021

Seitenzahl: 310

Beschreibung

T.C. Stallings burst onto the Hollywood scene in 2015 with his first leading role in the hit film War Room, which soared to #1 in the box office. But long before his acting success, he endured countless disappointments, setbacks, and failures. With unflinching honesty, Stallings shares his mesmerizing story of a life completely surrendered to Christ in Eyes Fixed. As a kid, Stallings was desperate to escape the housing projects of Cleveland and a life of crime, drugs, and gangs, so he joined a youth football league with hopes of one day becoming a professional player in the National Football League. Stallings was the first man in his family to graduate high school and then college. He enjoyed success as a professional athlete but anxiously waited for calls from the NFL that never came. With bills piling up and a family to support, Stallings relentlessly pursued God's purpose for his life and felt his passion shift from the football field to the silver screen. Join Stallings as he recounts the gritty details of his inspiring journey from pain, fear, and darkness to strength, courage, and success while keeping his eyes fixed on God's plan for his life. No exceptions. No compromise.  

Leseprobe

BroadStreet Publishing® Group, LLC

Savage, Minnesota, USA

BroadStreetPublishing.com

Eyes Fixed: My True Life Story

Copyright © 2021 T.C. Stallings

978-1-4245-6047-9 (softcover)

978-1-4245-6048-6 (e-book)

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form, except for brief quotations in printed reviews, without permission in writing from the publisher.

Scripture quotations marked NKJV are taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved. Scripture quotations marked NLT are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation. Copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, a Division of Tyndale House Ministries, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved. Scripture quotations marked NIV are taken from The Holy Bible, New International Version® NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.™ Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide. Scripture quotations marked ESV are taken from the ESV® Bible (The Holy Bible, English Standard Version®). Copyright © 2001 by Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved. Scripture quotations marked NASB are taken from the New American Standard Bible® (NASB). Copyright © 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. www.Lockman.org.

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DEDICATION

This book is dedicated to everyone in my life who has ever played a role in my becoming the man that God designed me to be. None of us may know the exact number of people who influence our lives—but I am still and will always be forever grateful.

-T.C. STALLINGS

CONTENTS

Foreword by Levette Stallings

Preface

Chapter 1Defenseless

Chapter 2Bare Feet

Chapter 3Impressions on Me

Chapter 4What Could’ve Been

Chapter 5The “Real” Lord of My Life

Chapter 6Levette

Chapter 7Unfulfilled

Chapter 8The Reset Button

Chapter 9One Last Time

Chapter 10A Change of Passion

Chapter 11Is This a Joke?

Chapter 12Eyes Fixed

Chapter 13Unscripted

Story Gallery

About the Author

FOREWORD

by Levette Stallings

There is an old metaphor that compares life or love to a roller coaster. That figure of speech couldn’t be a more perfect description of my time with T.C., especially since we both love coasters. In fact, we love them so much that our honeymoon and a few anniversaries have consisted of trips to amusement parks. We love the joy and excitement that accompany the thrill as we stand in line for our favorite ride or that tight grip in our stomachs with a bite of fear as we are buckling up for the first time on that newest, fastest, record-breaking coaster, making us question if we made the right decision. These emotions can very easily correlate with the many ups and downs and twists and turns of our life together. June 9, 2021, will mark twenty years of marriage for us. As I think about that, I realize that we have been together for almost half of our lives, and I have had a front row seat to a great many of T.C.’s greatest accomplishments, his struggles, trials, and triumphs, many of which he will address in this book.

So often people just see your victories, but few know of the tears, hard work, or previous failures that brought you to them. There are things that my husband has endured and experienced that would have broken many. I remember when we first started dating and he would share stories of his childhood. As I listened to his plight, I tried but couldn’t imagine walking in his shoes. My family wasn’t rich by any means; however, my parents were happily married, owned their home, both had good jobs, and my brother and I never had to want for anything. It was such a stark difference from T.C.’s childhood experience. I couldn’t help but admire his resilience. I think that’s one of the things that drew me to him. I could see someone who, no matter what life threw at him, would keep going and wouldn’t quit. He wouldn’t let life’s circumstances drag him down with them.

Being an athlete all my life, I have regarded actions more highly than words. Don’t just talk a good game; back it up. You want to get better at your sport; are you practicing? You want to get stronger; are you lifting? You want to win; then what effort are you putting forth? So it was refreshing to be with someone who didn’t just say that he was a Christian. I watched him put his faith into action. I could see that his strength came from his faith in Jesus. The things that he had experienced and endured through Christ shaped the man he was and pushed him to be better.

And T.C.’s road never seemed easy. There was always some hurdle he had to get over or some obstacle to overcome. Through his every hurt and disappointment, through every victory, through the joy and peace, even his times of extreme elation or the heartbreak of total defeat—I’ve marveled at his resolve to remain steadfast at seeking God’s will and purpose through it all. He would say this prayer, which he still does today: God, if this is from you, open the door. If not, please shut it. It is this complete trust in God that makes the victories in his life that much sweeter because they are God’s open door—God’s yes. I’ve noticed that even when T.C. doesn’t receive the outcome he has hoped for, initially there may be some disappointment, but it soon gives way to complete acceptance because he knows that when God says no, it’s just as important as when he says yes.

We love to look back over our lives and see how God’s puzzle pieces have fallen into place. Closed doors that didn’t make sense at the time are completely overshadowed by God’s open ones. Taking the time to see how God has been working throughout our lives makes trusting him that much easier. T.C.’s desire to pursue God’s will and purpose has become the driving force of our family. Every aspect of our lives is embodied with this in mind. It is one of the main reasons why I would line up for this roller coaster ride over and over again. So I hope as you read T.C.’s story, you will be inspired; I pray that, just as I am, you will also be motivated and encouraged by his resolution that no matter life’s burden, persecution, temptation, or even the promise of earthly rewards, nothing is worth compromising his faith and testimony and that you will see why T.C.’s eyes are so passionately fixed on Jesus.

Levette Stallings

PREFACE

Today, I can wholeheartedly say that I am extremely satisfied with my life. With stress, anxiety, depression, and all the many other challenges that come with being human, I feel very blessed to be able to say that nothing has prevented me from loving the life that God has called me to live. But loving life today has much to do with the events of my yesterdays and yesteryears. However, all these challenges that I am preparing to share with you have created a man who knows the importance of running my own race in life—and doing so to the best of my God-given ability—with my eyes focused solely on where God is leading me, rather than where Satan wants to take me.

I have been very hesitant over the years to tell my full story, to discuss all (or at least most) of my struggles and challenges. The main reason for my reservation is the fact that there is always someone in the world who will have had a much harder life, and I felt as though I’d been too fortunate to complain. But when I stopped questioning if my story was worth sharing (and I no longer compared my struggles to those of others), it became crystal clear to me why telling my story is important. Somebody needs to hear it, even if it were to be just one person. I reminded myself that—most likely—there is another “T.C.” in this world who is facing (or will face) the same types of challenges that I have faced. This person (or these people) will experience the same kind of pain, disappointments, fears, or failures—all of which (in my case) were eventually counterbalanced with maturity, strengthening, courage, and success. The way that I handled things simply made me a better person in several areas. Stories like mine can be life changing for someone else. It would be a shame to keep it to myself. Maybe you are that “other T.C.,” and my story is exactly what you need to hear today.

Before you dive into this book, I want you to know that I am not aiming to preach at you or teach you any particularly targeted lessons. This is not meant to be a devotional or a Bible study. This is just me. My life. Think of this as a friendly conversation; you and I sitting down to a cup of coffee or tea and simply having a real, candid chat. In fact, the remaining words written in this preface will be the closest things to me attempting to teach—and the only reason for that is because my story requires a bit of a setup. Context is everything. Knowing the heart behind this book will assist you in getting the most out of it—especially if you do not know anything about me at all. So just for a moment, I will go ahead and do the only small bit of “teaching” that I feel is necessary—which is simply me giving you the why of this book.

The story of my life is best summed up as a relentless attack by Satan to distract me from my purpose, bump me off center, and cause me to ignore my God-given purpose in life. Technically, for any Christ follower, this is the summation of your life too. The circumstances may be different, but the source and motivation are the same. The evil antagonist in your life is the same. Satan. The king of lies, evil, and temptation that can lead to sinful compromising within our relationship with Christ. A key word in all of this is compromising, which, in certain situations, is not always a bad thing. Compromising to reach a mutually positive result is not bad at all. For example, my wife and I compromise in our marriage whenever it is called for, which has led to a fulfilling, unselfish, wonderfully successful relationship. Positive compromising can apply to every area of life and will almost always yield a positive outcome. But, as with most things, an inherently good concept can always be perverted. Compromising is no different.

In a different context, compromising our walk with Christ in a sinful manner is one of the worst habits to develop. This lifestyle choice makes it so easy for Satan to have a negative influence in our lives and successfully distract us from the path we are designed to be on. God wants us to look “here” and “do this”; meanwhile, Satan tempts you to look “over there” and sinfully “do that” instead. Where we ultimately end up looking or going is heavily influenced by how much attention we pay to either promptings. How much time do we give Christ versus how much time do we spend entertaining Satan? And as we know, Satan doesn’t need a ton of time in order to be destructive, deceiving, or misleading. Just ask Adam or Eve.

As Christians, we know Satan shouldn’t get any of our attention. Ever. But I’m a realist, and I know that the struggle is real. I also know that we sometimes make it much worse of a struggle than it has to be. I’ve done that in my life. We know the choice is sinfully risky, but Satan is too persuasive. Sometimes we fall for his mess and allow him to lead us into thinking that “just a little bit” won’t hurt. It is that right there—a small, dangerous compromise—that gets us into big trouble. Entertaining the voice of Satan and the temporary pleasures of sin can spiritually intoxicate us, and in many cases, it will heavily influence the decisions we make. And it makes sense why this is true.

We tend to follow our focus. Our gaze. If this focus is consistently on Jesus, sinning is much less likely to entice us and catch us up. On the other hand, eyes away from Christ on a regular basis (and sometimes, even just for a moment!) gives sin an open invitation to take the lead. And if Satan can get you to take your eyes off Christ and God’s purposes for your life, then he has your spiritual temperature right where he wants it—lukewarm. Revelation 3:15–16 shows just how dangerous it is to find yourself in this situation:

I know your works: you are neither cold nor hot. Would that you were either cold or hot! So, because you are lukewarm, and neither hot nor cold, I will spit you out of my mouth. (ESV)

A lukewarm life is one that can potentially make us happy while angering God. Why? Because lukewarm living cheapens our faith. We become willing to take sinful chances, risks, and concessions that—if we had been focused on Jesus—we would never have agreed to take. At least not so easily.

But that’s just our sinful nature in our ear, powered by Satan, with the goal of disrupting our God-given flow, route, plan, and purpose—with a laser-focused intent of simply messing you up spiritually. I am talking about the literal act of trying to railroad the plan for your life that God himself took time to lovingly and purposely create. This is what has been happening to me my whole life, which brings me to the sole purpose of this book: to tell you how Satan has been attacking me from the beginning of my time on earth with the intention of compromising the plans that God intended for me.

Satan wanted me then (and now) to abort God’s plan A for his tempting and sinful plan B. He has been relentless, which you will clearly see as I share all the details with you. But, from the very beginning, God has always been faithful. He has always fought for me. And although I have been spiritually hurt, tripped up, and even knocked down, I have never been knocked out. To this day, the main reason I can make this claim is because God has consistently found a way to keep me focused on the goal of becoming what he designed me to be. Even when I did not know how to keep my life centered on his will and my eyes focused on his purposes, his grace led the way so that I could eventually figure it out. And once I learned how to lock in on Christ and his purposes for my life, there was no turning back. But first—Ihad to learn. And I am about to share with you exactly how I did just that.

Many of these things will be hard to talk about. Some of these things may be a bit embarrassing for me. But I need to share them with you so that you can see how easily my life could have gone in a totally different direction from where I am now. Many people constantly heap praise on the person I am these days. They see how I live my life, and I am often told how much people admire me. But I will never take any credit for where I am today or the man I have become. All glory goes to God. Writing this book will help many people see exactly why I feel this way.

Satan nearly ran my life over on so many occasions. He was so slick and sneaky that, in most cases, I never saw him coming. I did not sense his presence as he stalked me throughout my life. Today, people love to acknowledge the level of spiritual strength and maturity that I have. But I tend to celebrate the fact that God sustained me for many years when I was extremely weak and spiritually immature. Long before I built even an ounce of spiritual strength, grew an inch of spiritual maturation, or knew anything about the importance of the Holy Spirit’s power to fight sin—I was courted by Satan. Much too young (physically and spiritually) to recognize what was happening.

But God. His grace and his mercy never gave up on my ignorant, sinful soul. Unassumingly I entertained sin and its trapping pleasures, yet even then, my life and my purpose were both under God’s protection. While Satan was planning and executing attacks, God was preparing and putting into action the many defenses and life-lessons that I would need. The best part of it all is the day I finally realized what was going on. I saw what God was doing. Then I became a willing participant in the plan that he had for my life. The road to this point of reckoning was long and bumpy at times. Painful. Scary. But as you are about to see—from the very first breath I ever was blessed to take—it was purposeful.

“The most effective thing Satan can do is to distract you from what God has called you to do.”

-T.C. STALLINGS

Chapter 1

DEFENSELESS

Cleveland, Ohio.

Few would argue this point: a baby being born is one of the most beautiful things anyone could ever witness on earth, in my opinion. But it can also become a tragedy when the people responsible for bringing the baby into the world are not ready for that responsibility. And that is how my story begins.

My birth mother and father were not prepared to have a child. I was not planned for. I was not prayed for. I was not expected. Initially, my mother was not even excited. She was not joyful. She was not celebrating. In fact, she was terrified, and she had good reason to be. My father (at this time in his life) was heavily affected by drugs and alcohol during my mother’s pregnancy. He was in no condition to raise a son. Back then my mother did her fair share of drinking and partying as well. Because of these unhealthy lifestyles, my mother was fearful that if I were to be born, something could be terribly wrong with me. This was just one of the many things that gave my mother all kinds of fears about having me. Her financial stability was not the greatest, and her personal life was not where she wanted it to be just yet either. Both my mother and father had multiple children individually. They were not married. They were not happy with each other. They were barely involved in a meaningful relationship with each other. Then they found out that a huge responsibility was about to be added to the mix. Me.

As I said, my mother had other children before me—four by birth and one from adoption. So I had five siblings. But eventually, my mother shared with me that my birth should have constituted child number seven for my mom instead of six. Unfortunately, I don’t have a sixth sibling because my mother aborted him. Or her. We will never know. As if this was not surprising enough, it was the next thing that she told me that truly shocked me. She nearly experienced a second abortion. She teared up when telling me how close she was to making that same decision again; only this time we were talking about my life. I didn’t know how to process it. I can’t explain the cryptic feeling I was having while listening to her describe what almost happened to me. Her circumstances easily could have been too much to consider any other alternatives. She was financially strapped. She was physically and mentally abused. She did not have the best social influences in her life at the time of her pregnancy with me. And she had already found the nerve to push through an abortion once before. She was very close to proceeding with another one—and there was nothing I could have done about it.

Today, my mother is probably my biggest and greatest cheerleader (other than my wife). She loves Jesus as much as she can these days. She loves going to church and loves to sing in the choir. She doesn’t drink alcohol, she doesn’t smoke, and she doesn’t attend wild parties. With most decisions in her life, she knows that God must give her the okay to proceed. She prays for me. She loves me. She would give her life for mine right now, this second, if she had to. My mother is one of the best friends that I have. But in her early days, she used to be the exact opposite of everything I just said.

During the time of my mother’s pregnancy with me, Satan had more of a grip on her life than Jesus did. Her life was “wild,” in her own words. She made hasty and reckless decisions, she did what she wanted to do, and she had no respect for God’s will. In fairness to my mother, she was not raised to be any different. In our talks about her childhood and early adulthood, she explained to me that it had been a long, hard life of trial and error that brought her to where she is today. Obviously, many of her lessons were painful ones. Hard ones. Losing me to the choice of abortion would have been yet another difficult lesson. I can’t imagine having to confess to my child that I strongly considered aborting him. But she showed courage and wept her way through it.

We both struggled to discuss how my life nearly ended before it ever had a chance to start. It rocked my world to sit and really think about how close I came to losing the fight for my life. A one-sided fight, at that. I was defenseless, on the inside, at the mercy of people on the outside. I could not plead for my life. I could not tell her how much I loved her. She could not see me or look into my eyes. All I could do was wait in the womb while my life rested in the hands of two people whose lives were being torn apart by Satan. The circumstances were certainly not in my favor.

My parents never married. In fact, she left him during the pregnancy. He had his own set of problems that she felt did more harm than good to her life. My mother did not want him near her or me, and in her mind, any decision concerning my life was up to her, not my father—or anyone else. Of course, they constantly fought about this. The stress must have been crazy. I can easily see why it may have seemed easier to just get rid of me. My mother and I have such a great relationship today. These days, I talk to her just about every day on the phone. We laugh most of the time and act stupidly silly. She often tells me that the best part of her days are these goofy, silly phone calls because I always make her laugh.

To this day, my mother tells me that she doesn’t really know exactly why she never went through with the abortion. She says that there were a lot of factors, including fear. With her first abortion, she was young and didn’t really know what was happening. But with me, she was thirty years old, somewhat further along in her faith, and had a much more convicting conscience about what it would mean to abort the child that was growing inside of her. She literally had just enough of a relationship with the things of God to at least consider what he thought about what she was thinking of doing. Back then, she never directly credited her relationship with God for her decision not to abort me. But she contends that the little bit of Jesus that she had begun to experience at the time changed her heart. Talk about a little bit going a long way.

Neither one of us really cares about pinpointing exactly why she didn’t do it, or how—while not the biggest Christian at the time—she still managed to eventually muster up enough faith in God to trust him with her pregnancy. And if you ask me, I’ll tell you in a heartbeat why it didn’t happen: because God said no.

He defended me. Before I ever took one breath on earth, my life—and the plan that God had for it—was already on the brink of being destroyed. And that’s why I never forget to thank God for his sovereignty, grace, mercy, power, and love. I thank him for touching my mother’s heart. Yes, humanly speaking, I was completely defenseless in the womb, but spiritually speaking, I was never without protection. And when I think about it now, even as I sit and write this chapter, I am experiencing the same kind of peace that I imagine I must have felt in my mother’s womb. Think about that for a minute. On the outside, there was all kinds of turmoil in the lives of nearly everyone around me. Yet through it all, I just peacefully rested in the womb without a care in the world. No fear. No worries. All I knew how to do was control what I could control (which was mostly nothing at this stage) and let God finish what he started. And that is the most encouraging thing about all of this for me. His purposes prevailed. I was covered by God’s plans, which are unstoppable, and in this case, he planned for me to live.

What a gift. What a tremendous blessing. And that is why, even now, I aim to live my adult life the same as I did while I lay defenseless in the womb. I try to remember to live a life that remains totally dependent on God. The only difference now is that I know him. I’m aware of his presence. I actually get a chance (every day) to play a role in God’s plans by choosing to consistently be obedient to him. It is one thing to be a defenseless, unborn baby and having God fighting for you—but it’s a whole different ballgame when (while living out your life) you know you have God’s sovereignty, the leadership of Jesus, and the power of his Holy Spirit fighting for and through you.

When I came into the world on December 1, 1977, I wasn’t held by both parents in the hospital room, celebrated by a happily married couple as they marveled at what they had accomplished together. My father was not even in the room. When he somehow found out when and where I was born, he showed up to sign the birth certificate—but even that was done out of spite. My middle name is comprised of his full name, obviously by his choosing. (For many years, I hated that my name came to be from such volatile beginnings.) My mother did not intervene in the birth certificate shenanigans, and instead, she chose her battles wisely. She simply fled the scene. Now that I was born, she was committed to fighting for me and getting me off to a good start.

I know my mother loved me from day one, but I still wonder to this day how December 1, 1977, really felt for her, due to all the stress. She tells me that she experienced great joy, even though she almost immediately went on the run and into hiding with me. My family unit was broken before it could ever get going. My mother began the task of trying to raise me (and five other kids) as best she could.

Obviously, I was not born into the greatest of circumstances, but I was born on purpose, with a purpose. Considering the alternative, simply having a chance at life was my first ever “big blessing,” and it also marked the first huge hurdle of my life. It took my mother over thirty years to tell me this. I’m glad she did. She thought I’d be angry that she even considered having an abortion. But instead, I told her that I loved her even more because she rejected it. She trusted God to help her handle my birth. He gave her peace of mind so that she could think about allowing me to live. She had a choice: the easier life of continuing to raise the five kids she already had or making things tougher by bringing a sixth child into the mix.

She chose me. There is no way I could be mad about any part of that.

Chapter 2

BARE FEET

“Where is Toot? Where is that boy?”

Toot. That was my nickname growing up. Apparently, there was a popular song back in the 1980s in which the lyrics would say, “Don’t mess with my toot-toot.” Like most children who repeat anything they hear, I am told that I loved this song and would always sing along. Everyone thought it was cute the way I said “toot.” And there you have it. “Toot” (or “Tooter” if you used my mom’s version) was what everyone would call me. Sometimes when they called for me, I couldn’t answer—because I was not in the house. Apparently, I would often slip out of our small apartment in the Cleveland projects and head to the local community center that often handed out free lunches. So whenever they noticed that I was missing, they knew where to find me. No shirt. No shoes. Not even a pair of socks. Just a little boy, maybe six or seven years old, sitting on the steps of the free lunch building wearing only a pair of shorts. Elbows resting on my knees, chin resting in my cupped hands, fingers tapping my face, waiting for a free lunch. Hungry, yet excited to get a sandwich, I just sat on those steps, staring at my two dusty little bare feet, waiting for the door to open.

This part of my story happened so early in my childhood that I don’t remember it. So when my mother first told it to me (and she still does, all the time), I always have the same two thoughts. The first is that I think about how funny I must have looked—a half-naked little boy on the steps, first in line to get a free sandwich for lunch. But over time I begin to think about how blessed I was that I was never killed or kidnapped. Either of the two could very easily have happened in the inner-city housing projects of Cleveland where I grew up. But just like in the womb, the only thing I can attribute my safety to is God. Because drugs, crime, gangs, and other dangers were all around my family, the last word you can use to describe my childhood neighborhood is “safe.” But it’s obviously the first word that comes to mind when I think about how Jesus kept me. Safe.

My early childhood would be an indication of things to come in my life. I’d be raised rather loosely. This is not a shot at my mom or anyone else in my family. In fact, they were all raised the same way or close to it. It makes sense to me today why my upbringing was rather reckless because my mother’s upbringing was the same. Nobody knew any better. While I was loved tremendously by my family and I was relatively protected from most types of physical danger, I can’t say that I was very well protected from spiritual dangers: Satan, sin, and temptation. Once again, this is no knock on my family, but none of them were very spiritual. They were not close to God. They were not true followers of Jesus or committed to obeying Scripture. They did not fear God. None of us really knew what any of that meant or looked like, so we all pretty much lived by our own sets of rules. Unfortunately, this truly made life hard for all of us. Harder than it had to be.

Being the youngest in my home, I did not have a whole lot of independent choices to make. Like any other baby of any family, I was always at the mercy of choices others made for me. I had to deal with the residual fallout from choices made by those taking care of me, both positive and negative. While I didn’t learn a ton of spiritual or practical life lessons in my home, my mother did set one clear standard: obey her. That was easiest for me to adhere to, being the youngest.

I couldn’t get into as many situations as my older siblings could, should they choose to. But, since all six of us fell under that command, I had the opportunity to learn from the mistakes of my siblings—allowing me to know what not to do in certain situations when I did become old enough to make my own decisions. There is a flip side though. The sin I witnessed did not always come across to me as wrong. Sometimes, it looked like it worked out and felt good. And since I didn’t completely recognize sin for what it was, I looked at it as something I might try whenever I got a chance. Seeing the sin gave me a clear picture of what I could get myself into whenever I wanted to. I was always learning something from those in my home—whether they knew that I was or not.

I told you moments ago about me sneaking off from home for a free lunch. The reason I did this might be obvi-ous—we did not have much. We were not poor in the truest sense of the word, but we were a low-income family, and we did struggle. The food stamps, the government cheese, and other handouts were essentials. We always kept a can of roach spray under the sink. We had the pliers on the TV to turn the knob, the metal hanger in place of the broken antenna. We had the little TV sitting on top of the big one that didn’t work. I used to love fried bologna. Cheap foods. No worries, though. I was too young to understand the situation for what it was. If I saw a roach, I killed it and threw it away. It seemed normal.

I don’t remember feeling one way or the other about what we had or didn’t have during my youngest years. I think that does say a lot about the way I was treated. They treated me great. They loved me. They just didn’t know how to love God yet or how to show me how to love him, so the type of examples that I had to learn from were very worldly. Loose. Wild by nature. Lots of drinking, smoking, profanity. Again, this was normal for us. So why change it? And as for me taking it all in, well, I was just a “baby”—a very young kid—so nobody really cared what they said or did around Little Toot. But as I got a little older and my awareness of my surroundings got clearer—I began to pick up on more things. With age and experience, there comes a time when you do start to make some of your own choices in life.